With the aQuellé Midmar Mile just weeks away, rising swimming star Matthew Caldwell made a strong statement over the weekend, securing victory in two events at the final seeding swim at Prime View Adventure & Leisure in Midrand.
The Johannesburg swimmer’s impressive performances in the 3km and 1.2km events have set the stage for an exciting showdown at the world’s largest open-water race, which takes place in KwaZulu-Natal from 6-9 February.
The 18-year-old dominated the 3km race, winning in 34 minutes 36 seconds with Wian Bartleman taking second spot in 36:22 and Muhammed Adam third in 37:53.
In the 1.2km event, Caldwell crossed the finish in 14:23 with 14-year-old Matthew Goller second 46 seconds later and Claudio Domiter third in 15:11.
Caldwell has been steadily climbing his way up the elite men’s ranks at the aQuellé Midmar Mile in recent years, finishing 11th in 2022, then breaking into the top 10 with a seventh place in 2023, and finishing just off the podium in fourth spot last year.
While he will have New Zealand’s national 5km champion Louis Clark to contend with this year, he knows a strong local field will also be in the mix.
“I’m very excited about Midmar. It’s going to be a good race between myself and the other guys and with the internationals coming, it’s going to be very good, very tough,” he said, pointing to the likes of Henre Louw and Connor Albertyn (second in 2024) as those to look out for.
As for what draws him back to the hugely popular race each year, Caldwell reckoned: “It’s a very fun event… it’s good vibes there and it’s quite fun to swim in a straight line, no turns – just a straight line across the dam.”
Also planning her course across that straight line at the famous dam just outside Howick next month is Megan Shepherd. After finishing second to Loghan Gray in the 3km event, the Pretoria swimmer took first place in the women’s 1.2km event in Midrand on Sunday in a time of 16 minutes 17, with 14-year-old Zuria Venter second in 16:22, and Leah Markgraaff and Cassidy Sinclair sharing third place after both finishing in 16 minutes 23 seconds.
Shepherd said afterwards she has set her sights on another top-10 finish at the aQuellé Midmar Mile next month.
“I would hope for a top-10 finish so that’s where my goal lies,” she said, having claimed fourth place at last year’s race.
“There’s been a lot of training, we’re getting ready, we’re doing the recovery and we’re putting the effort in,” she added.
Meanwhile, race director Wayne Riddin was thrilled with the turnout and high level of competition at the seeding event, particularly with the participation of top international swimmers currently training in South Africa. Among them were Paris Olympic silver medallists Oliver Klemet (Germany) and Moesha Johnson (Australia), who won the respective men’s and women’s 5km events on Saturday.
Riddin also confirmed that the number of entries for next month’s aQuellé Midmar Mile is well up on this time last year.
“We are hoping it continues like that,” he said. “I think we’ll definitely go over 10,000 pre-entries by the end of next week so if we hit the 12,000 mark like we did before Covid, we’ll be over the moon,” he added.
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